Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Fe‘ilâtün Fe‘ilâtün Fe‘ilâtün Fe‘ilün

Gördi çeşmüm yine bir şâh-ı cihânı ne güzel
Sevdi cânum yine bir ḫûb-ı zamânı ne güzel
Gerçi gülşende iñen çoḳ biter serv-i sehî
Râstî bu ṣanemüñ ḳadd-i revânı ne güzel
Bitmedi bâġ-ı cihânda daḫi hiç bitmeyiser
Ruḫları güllerile ġonca dehânı ne güzel
Kirpügi oḳların atmaġa göñül pûtesine
Bu gözi âhunuñ ebrû-yı kemânı ne güzel
Her ki gördiyse cemâlin didi taḥsînler idüp
Mihrî'nüñ ḥaḳḳı budur rûḥ-ı revânı ne güzel

In English

1. My eye has once again seen a king of the world, how beautiful; my soul has once again loved a beauty of the age, how beautiful.

2. Although many tall cypresses grow in the rose garden, truly, how beautiful is the swaying stature of this idol. (Sanem means an idol; in divan poetry it is said of a beloved so beautiful as to be worshipped.)

3. None like her has grown in the garden of the world, and none will ever grow after; how beautiful is her rosebud mouth, with cheeks like roses.

4. To shoot the arrows of her eyelashes at the target of the heart, how beautiful is the bow-like eyebrow of this gazelle-eyed beauty. (The eyebrow is likened to a bow and the eyelashes to arrows; the target is the lover's heart.)

5. Everyone who saw her beauty said so with praises: this is truly Mihrî's beloved, how beautiful. (The line can be read in two ways: "this is truly the soul of Mihrî", or "this is what is due to Mihrî, the beloved who suits her".)

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The ninety-eighth ghazal of the divan stands in the section of the letter lâm and has five couplets. It is composed in the remel meter of the aruz (quantitative metre), in the pattern "Fe‘ilâtün Fe‘ilâtün Fe‘ilâtün Fe‘ilün". The redif (refrain word) is the exclamation "ne güzel", "how beautiful"; the rhyme rests on the sound "-ânı" (cihânı, zamânı, revânı, dehânı, kemânı). The ghazal is found only in manuscript Ü (51a); it is absent from the other three manuscripts. The single footnote of the edition records that the word "bâġ-ı" in the third couplet is written "bâġı" in the manuscript. There is no information about whom it was written for.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

This short ghazal is a poem of admiration for a newly known beauty. While in most ghazals the lover's pain, separation and reproach come to the fore, here there is no complaint; each couplet names one of the beloved's beauties and voices admiration with the exclamation "ne güzel". The word "yine", "again", is repeated twice in the opening couplet: the eye has again seen a beauty, the soul has again loved one. This phrasing gives the sense that the poet had given her heart before and welcomes a new love with joy.

From the second couplet to the fourth, the beloved's beauties are listed with the well-known similes of divan poetry: the stature is likened to the cypress, the cheeks to the rose, the mouth to the bud, the eyebrow to the bow, the eyelashes to arrows, the eye to the gazelle's eye. Gülşen Kaya cites the second couplet when she notes that in Mihrî's divan the cypress is the tree most often used for the beloved's stature, and the fourth couplet when she examines the places where the eyebrow is called a bow and the eyelashes arrows. The word "râstî" in the second couplet means "truly"; yet "râst" also means straight and upright, and so evokes the cypress's upright stature as well. The shifting of the word between these two meanings may be counted as a light example of tevriye (double entendre). The use together of "serv-i sehî" (the upright cypress), "ḳadd-i revân" (the swaying stature) and "gülşen" is tenasüp (congruence of images).

The third couplet contains a hyperbole: no such beauty has grown, or ever will grow, in the garden of the world. The coming one after the other of "bitmedi" (has not grown) and "bitmeyiser" (will not grow) strengthens this claim by embracing past and future together. In the fourth couplet the beloved is a hunter; she is gazelle-eyed, but it is she who shoots the arrows. The union of prey and hunter in the same person adds a subtle paradox to the couplet.

In the closing couplet the rhyme word "revân" comes once more, but with another meaning. In the second couplet "ḳadd-i revân" means a swaying stature; in the last couplet "rûḥ-ı revân" means life, spirit. The repetition of the same word with different meanings in the rhyme is a use close to cinas (pun). In this couplet the speech is given to those who see the beloved: everyone who sees her showers her with praise and says that this is Mihrî's beloved of the soul. The poet has her own choice confirmed by the admiration of others.

Bibliography

Primary sources

  • Mehmet Arslan (ed.), Mihrî Hâtun Dîvânı, Ankara: T.C. Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Yayınları (Kültür Eserleri Dizisi 576), 2018, p. 103, Ghazal 98 (Ü 51a only). ekitap.ktb.gov.tr
  • Sabiha Gemici, Mihrî Hatun Divanı: Karşılaştırmalı Metin, Cümle Yapısı ve Cümle Türleri, doctoral dissertation, Uludağ Üniversitesi, Balıkesir 1990 (ghazal 101 in Gemici's numbering).

Academic studies

  • Gülşen Kaya, Mihrî Hâtun Divânı'nın Tahlili, master's thesis, Fırat Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü, Elazığ 2010 (entries on eyebrow and bow, and the cypress). openaccess.firat.edu.tr
  • Sıtkı Nazik, "Benzer Redifli Şiirleri Bağlamında Mihrî Hatun ve Tâcî-zâde Cafer Çelebi'nin Karşılaştırılması", Uluslararası Amasya Âlimleri Sempozyumu Bildiriler Kitabı II, Amasya 2017, pp. 133-148 (table of refrains in Mihrî's divan: "ne güzel", G.98).

Books

  • Didem Havlioğlu (ed.), Ġazeliyyât-ı Mihrî-i Ḥaḳîre, OTAP electronic edition, ghazal 101 (text published on the türkoloji-iran page, 2007).

Online sources